I doubt they can take over all three in one year. Poor Shibs squared. Nice people too. They look like they are falling down the ladder and sadly that "evil" bronze medal that has been the jinx of many is roaring its ugly head (okay not all bronze medals are horrible but we have seen so many bronze medallists especially in dance and then disaster ie. a few years ago the Israeli team, the german team, the Ukranians I think.

After their bronze, they finished 6th, 7th, 6th and 6th in successive Worlds.

But people forget how young the Shibs are. Maia is just 18; very young for a dancer, and making adjustments to college this year. In fact, both Shib sibs are still making adjustments to growth changes.

Smart move. They're a lovely team, but if they're serious about moving up, especially post-Sochi, they need to make a change.

Originally Posted by Skater Boy

I doubt they can take over all three in one year. Poor Shibs squared. Nice people too. They look like they are falling down the ladder and sadly that "evil" bronze medal that has been the jinx of many is roaring its ugly head (okay not all bronze medals are horrible but we have seen so many bronze medallists especially in dance and then disaster ie. a few years ago the Israeli team, the german team, the Ukranians I think.

Shibs is already the plural version. Shibs squared is thus incorrect as it suggests that there are four of them - a mini-synchro team!

What killed C/S were the accusations of corruption (which had other skaters turning on them) and the lack of any sort of effective politikking push. That combination was not survivable. What's killing the Shibs is being the third team at Canton and getting caught on the wrong side of the Igor and Marina split - Igor's top NA team is in direct competition with the Shibs, and Marina is busy with V/M and D/W. Chock/Bates were very smart to go with Igor right off the bat.

Shibs is already the plural version. Shibs squared is thus incorrect as it suggests that there are four of them - a mini-synchro team!

Or is it 8? (Shib+Shib)2 = 4 Shib2.

What's killing the Shibs is being the third team at Canton and getting caught on the wrong side of the Igor and Marina split - Igor's top NA team is in direct competition with the Shibs, and Marina is busy with V/M and D/W. Chock/Bates were very smart to go with Igor right off the bat.

There may even be more to it than that. Igor's activities prior to the split cast doubt on the assumption that the Shibs would automatically move up to number one if Virtue and Moir and Davis and White retired after Sochi.

When the announcement of Igor's departure was made, the owner and the manager of the rink made prominent and explicit mention of the fact that "the skaters" were upset about Igor taking on the training of younger teams, independent of Zoueva. This was initially given as the primary reason why Igor was fired.

As I recall, later on they were forced to downplay this motive when the skaters, notably Davis and White, said they didn't know anything about it and were as surprised as anyone at the whole blow-up.

Doesn't (Shib+Shib)2 work out to 22, though? There are two Shibs, square that and you get 4. How did you arrive at 4 Shibs2?

An Army of Shibs. They should do that for their Youtube channel.

There may even be more to it than that. Igor's activities prior to the split cast doubt on the assumption that the Shibs would automatically move up to number one if Virtue and Moir and Davis and White retired after Sochi.

I have seen rumors that Mama Shib was none too happy with Igor, but this being a rumor, and such things being frowned upon at GS...